


waving from the shore

by somethingradiates



Series: smoke signals [3]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Missing Scene, Sibling Bonding, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-16
Updated: 2019-12-16
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:02:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,213
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21823375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/somethingradiates/pseuds/somethingradiates
Summary: There’s a long, silent moment, and somebody inside the car yells, and Billy - he doesn’t jump, but something tightens in his face for just a second before it goes away.  “If you can swing it,” he says, quiet, “I wanna - I don’t know - get breakfast, or something.  I don’t know.”  He’s quiet for a second.  “We don’t do that shit.  You and me.  I don’t know how to do this.”Max blinks.  Billy isn’t looking even anywhere close to her, staring at some fixed point in the distance.  The fingers on his good hand are flexing restlessly.  Before, she would think he was trying not to punch something.  Now she’s not sure.
Relationships: Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington
Series: smoke signals [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1568332
Comments: 11
Kudos: 226





	waving from the shore

**Author's Note:**

> a missing scene from [smoke signals](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21750184), between chapters nine and ten.

When Steve picks them all up on a Wednesday night in the middle of April, Billy’s with him.

It’s the first time everybody else has seen him since the night he left, just about two weeks ago, and Max can feel Lucas’ whole body tense next to her, like he thinks there’s going to be a fight. None of them know the details - Lucas knows more than anybody, and he doesn’t know much - they all just know that Billy doesn’t live at home anymore, that he’s living with Steve. It hasn’t endeared them to Billy. Dustin likes to speculate loudly about Billy blackmailing Steve, or brainwashing him. 

Will’s about the only one that hasn’t tried to interrogate her about why he’s there. Will’s the only one that says, quietly, “Hi, Billy,” like it’s totally normal that he’s leaning against Steve’s car with a cigarette in his hand, between his thumb and index finger. Steve’s standing next to him, almost close enough that their shoulders are touching. He isn’t smoking. It’s kind of sweet that he pretends he doesn’t smoke when they’re around.

Billy’s fingers are still taped - that’s the first thing Max notices. He sees her looking and switches hands, tucks that one into his sleeve. 

“Hey, Byers,” he says, and it sounds weird coming out of his mouth. Max didn’t know that he knew any of their names except Lucas’. Mike steps halfway in front of Will, like Billy’s going to lunge at them. “You got a second, Maxine?” 

“No,” Dustin says immediately, and says it like he’s not even going to let her talk, which - Max stomps on his foot, not nearly hard enough for the dramatic yelp she gets for her trouble. 

She looks at Billy for a second, assessing. He still looks like shit, but not quite as bad as he had the last time she’d seen him. She’s skated over to Steve’s a half-dozen times since the night Billy left, but Billy’s only ever let her stay a few minutes, and a couple of times Steve has turned her away altogether, looking drawn and tired and saying that Billy was asleep, even at noon or three in the afternoon. 

Max figures he’ll look progressively less like shit as time goes on. She looks away. “Yeah,” she says. “Sure.” 

Dustin huffs next to her, but crams himself into the backseat with everybody else when Steve tells them to get in. He does try to call shotgun, which Steve nixes as soon as it’s out of his mouth. There’s some bitching about who does get it - _are you kidding, he didn’t even call it!_ \- but the doors shut, and it’s muffled almost to silence. 

Billy clears his throat, takes a step away from the car. He still moves stiffly, and there’s a tight, exhausted quality to his face when Max looks at him again, a little more carefully. The bruising is getting better, but his lip doesn’t look like it’s healing much at all. Something lurches in her stomach. 

_How are you doing,_ she wants to ask, or _how are you feeling_ , or _have you told anyone_ , but she doesn’t say any of it. She knows better. She knows him, knows that Billy can still bite when he’s tired and hurt, and bite hard. She’s been on the receiving end too many times to try again, gotten too many snarled _go fuck yourself, Maxine_ s when she’s tried to help or ask questions, gotten too many doors slammed in her face. 

“How’s it been going,” he says finally. He’s not talking about school. 

“Okay,” she says. She shifts her weight from one foot to the other, a little nervously. “Really. He’s not - he’s fine.” 

_My mom cleaned up your room,_ she wants to say, _my mom bagged up all your shit and your dad took it to the dump,_ wants to say _my mom is scared shitless now that you’re not around,_ wants to say a hundred things, each truer and more hurtful than the last. 

“Okay,” Billy says. “You have to tell me if he’s not, Max.” 

“I know.” She does. She already got that talk from him, and from Steve, too. She’d never seen Steve Harrington look so serious. 

There’s a long, silent moment, and somebody inside the car yells, and Billy - he doesn’t jump, but something tightens in his face for just a second before it goes away. “If you can swing it,” he says, quiet, “I wanna - I don’t know - get breakfast, or something. I don’t know.” He’s quiet for a second. “We don’t do that shit. You and me. I don’t know how to do this.” 

Max blinks. Billy isn’t looking even anywhere close to her, staring at some fixed point in the distance. The fingers on his good hand are flexing restlessly. Before, she would think he was trying not to punch something. Now she’s not sure. 

“Okay,” she says. “Sure.” She’s got to think for a moment. “We don’t have school tomorrow.” She’s not sure if Billy knows that. She’s not even sure if Billy has been back to school yet. 

Billy lets out a breath. His fingers are still flexing. “If my dad sees,” he starts, and doesn’t have to finish. 

“I know,” Max says. “He won’t. It’ll be okay.” She clears her throat, notices over Billy’s shoulder that Dustin and Lucas are both pressed practically flat-faced against the window, watching. She resists the urge to flip them off. “Nine? At the diner?” 

“Yeah,” Billy says immediately. “Sure. Sounds good.” 

“Hey,” Steve calls, and - it’s not loud, but it’s right behind Billy, and this time Max can’t pretend he didn’t about jump out of his skin. _Fuck_ , Max thinks. “We gotta go.” 

“Yeah,” Billy says again. “Okay.” 

Max sits up front, between Steve and Billy, and tries not to think about how tightly Billy’s pressing himself against the door. 

\----

Max is ten minutes late to the diner the next morning. Billy’s in the booth way in the back, back by the door that has the big neon _exit_ sign on top, watching the front. Steve’s car isn’t out front - surely he didn’t walk, not from Steve’s house - Steve must have dropped him off, she guesses. It’s weird, thinking about Billy without the Camaro. 

This whole thing is weird. She plops down in the booth across from him anyway. At least she’ll get pancakes out of it. 

Billy doesn’t say anything about her being late, just mumbles _hey_ and looks at the door. He’s got his good hand curled around his mug of coffee. She can’t see his other hand. He’s keeping his face turned a little bit, too, so that the bad side isn’t towards her, like if she can’t see it it’s not there. 

She orders pancakes and two orders of bacon, and catches the little smile on Billy’s face after. He gets scrambled eggs and another cup of coffee. “I’ll get a coffee, too,” Max says, while the waitress is walking away. 

“That shit’ll stunt your growth,” Billy says, but halfheartedly. 

“Didn’t stunt yours,” she says. It’s not that Billy’s particularly tall - Mike’s probably taller than him at this point - but still. 

“Yeah, well.” 

The conversation dies there, and stays dead until the waitress brings out their food. Max scoots one pancake off to the side and stacks her bacon on top of the other crosshatch, then drowns the whole mess in syrup. Billy hasn’t touched his eggs yet. When Max looks up at him, a couple bites in, she puts her fork down. 

“Have you been sleeping?” She doesn’t really mean to ask, knows better than to try to dig into Billy’s life or Billy’s problems, then thinks for a second about a floor full of broken glass and - she thinks maybe she’s allowed to, by now. And she wants to know, anyway. 

“Yeah,” Billy says, right away, but then he’s quiet. “Yeah. Kind of.” 

“You look like shit,” Max says, more gently than she intends. 

Billy grins with half his mouth, takes a careful drink of his coffee. it doesn’t reach his eyes. “Yeah,” he says again. “Look, I didn’t - I wanna talk to you.” 

Max waits a second. When Billy doesn’t say anything else, she says, warily, “Okay?” 

He looks so fucking different, she realizes suddenly. It’s not the bruises, or at least not just them. He’s holding himself differently, and there’s tension but not the kind she’s used to, not the weird, angry stiffness that Billy carries around with him. She wonders when he’ll pick it back up, when he’ll be himself again. 

“About home,” he says. “About California.” 

Max feels like a door slams shut inside her chest, knows she can’t stop the thing her face does, the way her mouth tightens. “Right now? Seriously?” 

It’s been a long time since Billy reminded her what a piece of shit she was, how she upended all of their lives, how she ruined his, took him away from California and the shore and his friends, away from Dylan Donnelly, who Billy always thought he hid and never quite did. His dad has never said anything to her, not a single word about it, but he’s never had to, not while Billy’s around, because Max already fucking knows. She doesn’t know why he’s doing this now. 

“I’m sorry,” Billy says, and seems like he’s trying hard not to look anywhere near her, eyes on the door, then down at his coffee. “I. You were trying to help. It wasn’t your fault.” 

Max blinks at him. She’s not sure what to say, not even kind of, so she doesn’t really plan on saying anything, but she ends up eeking out _what?_ , embarrassingly quietly. 

“It wasn’t your fault,” Billy says again. He’s still looking at his coffee like he’s thinking about drowning himself in it. “You - you did the right thing.” He clears his throat, reaches up to run his fingers through his hair. It’s dark, she thinks. All that blonde had been from California, back when he’d been in the sun all the time, when he’d leave the house before the sun came up and spend every single summer day on the beach, away from them, away from his dad. 

It had been bad there, too. Billy hadn’t been so angry then, had never egged it on like he did here. Back home, he’d mostly just been gone; when he was in the house, it was like he was biding his time until he could leave again. 

Max swallows, hard, past the sudden lump in her throat. She thinks about it all the fucking time. She’s wondered, before, if Billy ever realized that. She’d decided a long time ago that he never bothered, but now she’s not as sure. 

There’s a long silence. When Billy speaks again, it’s quieter. “I’m sorry I blamed you. I’m sorry I was such an asshole all this fucking time. It was never your fault, Max.” 

“Jesus _Christ,_ Billy,” Max says, hates the way her voice cracks, hates the way she has to rub at her eyes all the sudden. “Where the fuck did that come from?” 

“Hey,” Billy says, and he’s looking at her, now, looks concerned, and that makes everything a hundred times worse. Max can feel herself flushing, half out of embarrassment and half out of anger. He’s not allowed to give a fuck if she’s crying. “Hey, Max, fuck, I’m sorry - “ 

“It’s _fine,_ ” she says impatiently, swipes at her eyes one final time before she takes a breath. “What the fuck, Billy, did you just - just wake up one day and change your mind?” 

Billy’s drumming his fingers against his mug, off-rhythm and awkward and restless. “I told Steve,” he says finally, and it comes out like he’s confessing something. “Why we left. I told him what you - what happened.” He clears his throat, glances around them. There’s nobody anywhere near. This is a shitty place to have this talk, Max thinks. “I never thought - it was just easier to be mad. He made me think about it.” 

Max rubs at her eyes again, just in case. “You told Steve,” she says finally. 

“Yeah.” Billy actually looks at her this time, careful and head-on. She meets his eyes. He really does look awful, she thinks, underneath the mess of his face. She’s seen him look tired a thousand times but never like this. “You called Steve.”

There’s nothing accusatory in his voice, but Max still says, hotly, “I didn’t know what else to _do_.” 

“I know.” Billy pokes at his eggs halfheartedly, fumbles clumsily with the fork. Max looks away. It feels like something she shouldn’t be seeing. “I’m not mad.” 

Instinctively, Max wants to say _I don’t give a shit if you’re mad,_ but that’s not the kind of talk they’re having. “Okay,” she says, a little lost. “Cool. Good.” 

Billy glances at her plate, then her face. He looks like he’s searching for something, trying to read something that isn’t there. She’s gotten good at not letting him see her. She wonders, now, if she wasted her time. “Eat your goddamn pancakes, Maxine,” he says tiredly, but he sounds curiously fond. 

“Fuck off,” Max says, more out of habit than anything, but she picks up her fork again.


End file.
